Parked bikes at the King Street Metro Station in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia over the weekend.

Kabul, Afghanistan doesn’t have quite as much snow on the ground as the two feet dumped on in the DC area. This cyclist rides past the destroyed Darul-Aman palace in Kabul.

Sun Microsystems made puns using the Sun name for several internal tools and programs. Here are some that come to mind; I’m sure there are others.

* Sun TEA (travel expense authorization)
* Sun TAN (old name for a training program)
* SunWay (the shuttle service)
* SunScreen (background checks)
* Sun Spot
* Sun LAMP (loaner equipment for demos)
* SunDial (HR help desk)

Anybody who spent any time at all with Sun Microsystems will remember at least a couple of these.

Those around the US westEAST coast: I hope you’re enjoying the snow! Shoot your snow biking photos my way (links to Flickr or other photo sharing site) and I’ll post them on Monday.

This is cool: The cyclist takes the lane on a 55 mph divided 4 lane highway with 12 foot lanes and 8 foot shoulders.

Discussion at Commute Orlando: Mythbusters on Highway 535.

To accuse a cyclist of being militant, selfish or rude for riding in the lane is nothing more than car-centric bias assuming the bicycle driver is of lesser status than the motor vehicle driver — especially in context of how easy it is to see and safely pass a cyclist.

Those of us who choose to ride in the lane vs the shoulder do not insist that others make the same choice if they are not comfortable with it. We simply provide information to allow others to make the choice based on something more than knee-jerk fear of the unknown. The only thing we insist upon is protecting our right to ride in the part of the road where we feel safest and most comfortable.

Yikes! Cyclists have been fighting shoulder rumble strips for years, so why do people like these wheel diverters all of a sudden?

POM Wonderful sent a sample of their Pomegranate juice for me to review. I usually like to take a photo of the product I review, but here’s all the plague of locusts in my home (aka my teen son and growing daughter) left me with.

Ah well. I’ve seen the cute little bottles at the grocery store, but I’ve always thought “Pomegranate? Bleh!” POM makes claims about the antioxidant content and they like to brag about the tens of millions of dollars in scientific research that shows the health benefits of drinking POM. But if it doesn’t taste good, what good does it do? The stuff is pricey, and I’m generally skeptical of superfood health claims.

I took a swig of POM’s juice (100%, no sugar or other ingredients added) and it’s actually pretty good. It’s tart and sweet, reminiscent of cranberry juice but not quite as strongly flavored (in my opinion — other reviewers say the flavor is stronger!)

Don’t take my word for it, though: see what my children did! They don’t care about POM Wonderful’s sponsorship of Garmin – Transitions Cycling Team, or that their fruit is all grown here in California, their local manufacturing and bottling operations, or the antioxidant content. They just like the flavor and they’re asking me to buy more at the store.

POM Wonderful is available pretty much everywhere you can buy refrigerated juices, at least here in California. POM Wonderful’s pomegranate juice are generally available larger bottles. Some of the flavor combinations with Kiwi, Mango, Blueberry and Cherry seem especially intriguing to me.

More information at POM Wonderful.

The California Highway Patrol incident reports are maddeningly short on details, providing just a tantalizing hint of information. Take this report last night in Orange County, for example. I’ve translated some of the abbreviations and codes to English language and put the dispatches in chronological order.

The dispatch says “Santa Ana” but Weir Canyon Rd and the Riverside Freeway are actually in Anaheim (I think). “Santa Ana” is the local highway patrol office. “Station 17” is presumably the local fire department.

Huffington Post featured a Bike Lanes Around the World slideshow yesterday. If you read Cyclelicious and Copenhagenize (or similar bike blogs), you’ve likely seen all of these illustrations already.

Avoid the comments — even at the left leaning Huff Post, there are depressing attacks on “smug” cyclists. *sigh*